The issue with reviving in story fights

[Danikat.8537]

Bear in mind it's not always the same people who have trouble with everything.

 

There's some story missions I've found extremely difficult, usually because I didn't understand the mechanics involved (in some cases I still don't fully understand it, even after beating it solo) including some which I was assured are "embarrassingly easy" or so simple there is no way you could reach that point in the story if you were unable to beat it. But there's others where I see lots of people complaining about how difficult it is and I genuinely struggle to understand why because I had no trouble at all.

 

So it's not (always) as simple as saying if someone has trouble with a fight it's because they're a bad player and need to improve. I'll happily do the entire Departing story (the one where you fight the Eater of Souls) solo on any of my 7 level 80's (I'd say any profession, but if you want me on a Guardian, Mesmer, Necromancer or Revenant you'll be waiting a while for me to level up) but if you want me to do Confessor's Stronghold where you fight [Justiciar Adrienne](https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Justiciar_Adrienne "Justiciar Adrienne")...you're also going to be waiting a while. I've done it, I _wrote_ the walkthrough on the Wiki and it still takes me multiple tries to get it right.

 

But as I said earlier I don't think a stat boost, or even making difficult fights easier, is the solution. Especially since the fights I tend to have trouble with require very specific mechanics where simply throwing a more powerful character at it wouldn't help at all. I'd prefer clearer indications of what you need to do, especially in the personal story missions where there's often no indication of some things. For example something to tell you that in [Estate of Decay](https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Estate_of_Decay "Estate of Decay") the additional enemies around the Mouth of Zhaitan don't respawn infinitely (only at specific points) so it's better to clear them out first, then focus on the boss.

[Illconceived Was Na.9781]

The thing about the story missions is: they can _always_ be done by five people. So when looking for a "one size fits all" level of difficulty, I think it's better to err on the side of "too difficult for some to do solo" rather than spend any effort on mechanics that rebalance the fight for people who are struggling.

 

@"Danikat.8537" raised some great points above:

* This particular suggestion _rewards_ people for failing, rather than helping them to get better. There has to be some signal by the game that "you might want to reconsider your plan."

* The people struggling with Instance A aren't the same who struggle with Instance B.

* The reasons people struggle aren't always the same.

 

And other people pointed out that

* One size is never going to fit all (whether ANet is or is not good at balancing).

* "Too easy" has just as many gameplay issues as "too hard," just for different people.

[Warscythes.9307]

> @"Illconceived Was Na.9781" said:

> The thing about the story missions is: they can _always_ be done by five people. So when looking for a "one size fits all" level of difficulty, I think it's better to err on the side of "too difficult for some to do solo" rather than spend any effort on mechanics that rebalance the fight for people who are struggling.

>

> @"Danikat.8537" raised some great points above:

> * This particular suggestion _rewards_ people for failing, rather than helping them to get better. There has to be some signal by the game that "you might want to reconsider your plan."

> * The people struggling with Instance A aren't the same who struggle with Instance B.

> * The reasons people struggle aren't always the same.

>

> And other people pointed out that

> * One size is never going to fit all (whether ANet is or is not good at balancing).

> * "Too easy" has just as many gameplay issues as "too hard," just for different people.

 

Hey, thank you for raising those points. I originally just wrote this thread in a hurry during lunch break as bit of a rant but it looks like it actually fostered a bit of discussion.

 

I want to clarify some of the points that I made in a hurry though. I do not want the fights easier because right now it cannot get any easier. You literally cannot fail because you will be revived when you die. Yes I completely understand that ideally you want the fights to teach players mechanics and have the players learn on their own and then properly executing them. The catch up system is not for those people. Right now I think literally anything will be better than what we have as there is no chance of failure involved.

 

The sole reason that I do not think the buff will be abused is simply because it did not happen in FFXIV/WOW. Sure people are definitely a lot more lazy with the mechanics, but people did not intentionally suicide and the chance of failure is still involved. Yes I understand that helping the players and make them better would be the ultimate solution. However you have to understand that it is impossible for people who are poor players to suddenly become good players in 20 minutes. This is exacerbated by the fact that there are huge difference between players stat wise due to the fact you can make builds on your own.

 

In other MMOs in general, while there are some degrees of customization; the difference of power between max level players are only so much. In GW2, the difference between a good build and a bad one can mean the difference between a 10 minute fight and a 30 seconds one. This is what I am hoping to close the gap on. You cannot suddenly make bad players better mechanically , so at least making their stats closer to the better builds would at the very least be a better solution than the current reviving. You have to understand that some players are very very bad at making builds. I am a somewhat frequent raider who runs around in dps gear and I was completely baffled that people had serious trouble with any of the story fights. Soul eater? I legitimately just bursted him down and didn't realize he has a cc phase. The confessor fight? I just ran around and dps'd him down without any worries. However I have seen people with absolutely dreadful builds like a reaper who camps just staff in soldier gear trying to dps, or warrior who camp rifle in cleric with healing shouts, or mesmers in full rampager that just stand on the side and use greatsword 1. Sure anything works in open world but put them in anything that is slightly challenging and you will see them fall apart. Some players might even be fine mechanically but the fact the build itself is absolutely dreadful means that even if they can get better, they cannot because their own character is holding them back. That is what I am hoping this will hopefully improve. Just stick a somewhat reasonable cap on the buffs(50%-80%?).

 

 

[Khisanth.2948]

I can think of LS episodes with fights where this wouldn't help at all. The most two recent ones comes to mind. Also head of the snake and a crack in the ice. The two fights with the dragon and the centaur.

 

> @"Danikat.8537" said:

> Bear in mind it's not always the same people who have trouble with everything.

>

> There's some story missions I've found extremely difficult, usually because I didn't understand the mechanics involved (in some cases I still don't fully understand it, even after beating it solo) including some which I was assured are "embarrassingly easy" or so simple there is no way you could reach that point in the story if you were unable to beat it. But there's others where I see lots of people complaining about how difficult it is and I genuinely struggle to understand why because I had no trouble at all.

>

> So it's not (always) as simple as saying if someone has trouble with a fight it's because they're a bad player and need to improve. I'll happily do the entire Departing story (the one where you fight the Eater of Souls) solo on any of my 7 level 80's (I'd say any profession, but if you want me on a Guardian, Mesmer, Necromancer or Revenant you'll be waiting a while for me to level up) but if you want me to do Confessor's Stronghold where you fight [Justiciar Adrienne](https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Justiciar_Adrienne "Justiciar Adrienne")...you're also going to be waiting a while. I've done it, I _wrote_ the walkthrough on the Wiki and it still takes me multiple tries to get it right.

 

The answer to that is S/F FA tempest. :p

Overload Air is such a cheap attack.

 

>

> But as I said earlier I don't think a stat boost, or even making difficult fights easier, is the solution. Especially since the fights I tend to have trouble with require very specific mechanics where simply throwing a more powerful character at it wouldn't help at all. I'd prefer clearer indications of what you need to do, especially in the personal story missions where there's often no indication of some things. For example something to tell you that in [Estate of Decay](https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Estate_of_Decay "Estate of Decay") the additional enemies around the Mouth of Zhaitan don't respawn infinitely (only at specific points) so it's better to clear them out first, then focus on the boss.

 

o_O

 

Never encountered that issue. Though I know you can mess up the instant by killing a chicken at the wrong time ...

[bobsort.4097]

> @"Vagrant.7206" said:

> An inverted death penalty?

>

> What would prevent players from just suiciding a few times at the beginning to make their lives easier?

 

Why would you think players even like to play this content, while its reward is a low as just a champion bag, but doing it takes over 40 minutes die and redo?

[bobsort.4097]

> @"Warscythes.9307" said:

> Whereas everytime if the player dies then he gains a stacking buff that gives +5% to all stats instead?

They already did give you this. in fact everytime you die, one piece your armor breaks and you get -%5 buff to every stat you have, until your armor totally breaks and become red and you are permanently stuck in that story instance.

[bobsort.4097]

> @"Zaklex.6308" said:

> Actually a player can get better in 20 minutes...if they take the time to just pay attention to the mechanics and listen to the NPC's and/or Dragon Watch members there, they will give you hints on what you need to do to defeat most bosses in story instances.

 

This was the most annoying comment that I keep seeing over and over. How do you beat an AOE damage which from appearing damage circle until it hits takes 500ms and brings your health to %5 and happens every 10 second and its on a ping of 500MS? I find story instances really really annoying.

[Blood Red Arachnid.2493]

> @"bobsort.4097" said:

> > @"Zaklex.6308" said:

> > Actually a player can get better in 20 minutes...if they take the time to just pay attention to the mechanics and listen to the NPC's and/or Dragon Watch members there, they will give you hints on what you need to do to defeat most bosses in story instances.

>

> This was the most annoying comment that I keep seeing over and over. How do you beat an AOE damage which from appearing damage circle until it hits takes 500ms and brings your health to %5 and happens every 10 second and its on a ping of 500MS? I find story instances really really annoying.

 

Nearly all enemy attacks are on a cycle, or they have a triggering condition (I.E. the distance you are from the enemy). If you learn the pattern or learn the conventions of game design, you can do quite a bit even with half second lag. I've done more and worked with less. If it happens every 10 seconds, then you know when it is coming and have little excuse.

[battledrone.8315]

> @"Steve The Cynic.3217" said:

> > @"battledrone.8315" said:

> > story and open world should be for everybody, making it too hard will just make people quit and play something else

>

> I'm going to change one word in that sentence. Tell me if you think it becomes more or less true...

>

> "story and open world should be for everybody, making it too **easy** will just make people quit and play something else"

>

> If you make it too hard, the less focussed players will become frustrated and quit, but if you make it too easy, the more focussed players will become bored and quit. Not the hard-core raiders or PvP gods, but the people who like to play through stories and have the climactic fights be, well, climactic.

>

> Perhaps all I'm saying is that you CANNOT make any one piece of the game "for everybody". Despite the complaints about it (common to many games), the writing for the main story is NOT desperately bad (I quite like most of it, in fact). There are places where it has unwarranted continuity breaks (e.g. when a Sylvari player goes to see the Pale Tree in the Claw Island segment of the core PS, and the Pale Tree talks to the character in the same phrasing she uses with non-Sylvari), but all stories have that. For sure not everyone plays an MMORPG for its story/stories (some load up a story-heavy MMORPG like SWTOR or even GW2 and jump straight into PvP of some sort and never, ever touch even one word of story ever after), but many do, and they have a wide, wide range of skill at learning to play. Some people, frankly, suck at playing, and suck at learning to play better, and there's relatively little you can do for them without inducing the more skilled to die of boredom.

>

> The most recent major expansion of SWTOR, "Knights of the Eternal Throne," includes a fairly serious, slightly mechanicky fight against one of the major antagonists. It's not mechanicky like the Glint's Lair segment of LS2 is, with the faffing about picking up colours, transferring fragility, and all that stuff, but it isn't *just* spank-and-tank. I found it a bit heavy going until I "connected" to the mechanics, at which point it became fairly straightforward. It turns out that it's a lot closer to just spank-and-tank than you might at first think.

>

> And of course the SWTOR forums are littered with the corpses of threads where someone hit that fight and bounced, and posted a vitriolic complaint about impossible fights in main-line story content. In almost every case, the ones who just ask for help get useful advice, and the ones who post bile about it being impossible get mocked more or less politely by players who are, evidently, "impossibilists", capable of doing the impossible, i.e. beating the fight.

 

everyone is going to quit at one point, the question is, how much of the game they get to play before that happens

its not desperately bad? zaitan? does that ring a bell?

"going to the desert, to kill a god"...do you think THAT is good story?

it isnt, it has more plot holes and and even less continuity than the last jedi

[mauried.5608]

There are 2 fundamental problems this thread.

The first one is the common phrase "I did this so therefore you can."

Which assumes that all players in the game have the same skill level, which they obviously dont.

The second is the most important one and also the one thats completely ignored, and thats how good a players keyboard dexterity and mouse skills are.

If you are a 2 finger typist like me, then all the ingame skills, builds, traits , you name it are irrelevant as you simply cant react fast enough for many of the fights, as you cant punch the keyboard buttons fast enough.

Slowing down the whole fight including all the actions of all the content , player included would help, but this isnt an option.

Far too many of the fights in this game are simply too fast.

 

 

[bobsort.4097]

> @"Blood Red Arachnid.2493" said:

> If it happens every 10 seconds, then you know when it is coming and have little excuse.

Obviously you have no clue how playing with 500ms latency looks like. I made one just for you

 

 

 

[Westenev.5289]

> @"mauried.5608" said:

> There are 2 fundamental problems this thread.

> The first one is the common phrase "I did this so therefore you can."

> Which assumes that all players in the game have the same skill level, which they obviously dont.

> The second is the most important one and also the one thats completely ignored, and thats how good a players keyboard dexterity and mouse skills are.

> If you are a 2 finger typist like me, then all the ingame skills, builds, traits , you name it are irrelevant as you simply cant react fast enough for many of the fights, as you cant punch the keyboard buttons fast enough.

> Slowing down the whole fight including all the actions of all the content , player included would help, but this isnt an option.

> Far too many of the fights in this game are simply too fast.

 

I hate to hammer home your point, but I'm a two finger typest too. It took me awhile to get used to wasd movement (laying my fingers on asdf spacebar like one of those information technology nerds), but I eventually got the hang of it.

 

I still prefer 2 finger typing for writing, but 5 finger typing does give you more control over the keyboard. If you like the game, it's worth a try.

[Khisanth.2948]

> @"Blood Red Arachnid.2493" said:

> > @"bobsort.4097" said:

> > > @"Zaklex.6308" said:

> > > Actually a player can get better in 20 minutes...if they take the time to just pay attention to the mechanics and listen to the NPC's and/or Dragon Watch members there, they will give you hints on what you need to do to defeat most bosses in story instances.

> >

> > This was the most annoying comment that I keep seeing over and over. How do you beat an AOE damage which from appearing damage circle until it hits takes 500ms and brings your health to %5 and happens every 10 second and its on a ping of 500MS? I find story instances really really annoying.

>

> Nearly all enemy attacks are on a cycle, or they have a triggering condition (I.E. the distance you are from the enemy). If you learn the pattern or learn the conventions of game design, you can do quite a bit even with half second lag. I've done more and worked with less. If it happens every 10 seconds, then you know when it is coming and have little excuse.

 

Most of the recent story fights seem to have enemies that phase based on their HP so that is even easier to predict.

[Elva.6372]

I would prefer the STORY MODE to be focused on progressing the story and less on obnoxious, long drawn out encounters or trap puzzles.

 

Obviously, ANet is somewhat aware of the issues over the years because they have gone back and addressed many story encounters.

 

I do not want story mode to be more difficult than open world PvE for my 13 characters.

 

Ah, but some say, "It's not difficult, just learn the mechanic".

 

Yet, somehow forget that still requires timing and reaction skills that not all of us have.

 

I still haven't beaten the story that takes place in the Volcano and the portion with two Warhounds, the timing and aiming while aloft is aggravatingly difficult for me...so I shelved that and skipped the story, picked up PoF story on another character.

 

I hate doing that, I'd like to have my all characters stay in sync with the story as they move through the game world - but I don't want to subject myself to 20, 30 minutes or more of frustration when these inconsistent difficulty spikes rear up in the story chapters.

 

(I think SWTOR did story modes rather well)

 

I've been gaming MMO's for 3 decades now, GW2 is a fine game but the Devs swerve too far on arcade gaming mechanics side of things. I chose and favored MMO's because they were lore centric, often fantasy based, games that generally didn't incorporate all the things I was not that good at...

 

I am not proficient at twitch gaming, I am fairly certain that has always been the case, but at 50+ years old, I doubt I will suddenly develop new gaming proficiencies.

 

 

 

 

[Blood Red Arachnid.2493]

> @"bobsort.4097" said:

> > @"Blood Red Arachnid.2493" said:

> > If it happens every 10 seconds, then you know when it is coming and have little excuse.

> Obviously you have no clue how playing with 500ms latency looks like. I made one just for you

>

>

>

>

 

When I say I've worked with worse, I mean it. I've been in Triple Trouble and Arkk with that kind of lag, and won.

[MarshallLaw.9260]

> @"battledrone.8315" said:

> > @"MarshallLaw.9260" said:

> > > @"battledrone.8315" said:

> > > > @"MarshallLaw.9260" said:

> > > > > @"Warscythes.9307"

> > > > Personal story content has never been hard enough to warrant this. If a player is stuck at a certain stage, they are either not familiar with combat mechanics of their class, under-geared or simply need some help.

> > > > If you are finding the basic fight difficult, check your gear and build are suitable - don't expect to be able to survive in a lvl80 zone with lvl15 _Fine_ gear. If build and gear are in order, it's your combat which needs work. If you cannot improve, ask friend for help.

> > > > After finishing the regular PoF story path, I went back to complete some of the chapter achievements and found that there was one where I couldn't complete on my own (_Keen Eye_ achievement https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Hallowed_Ground_(story)), so I just requested assistance from a friend in my guild.

> > > >

> > > > The idea that making something easier and dumbing it down is a good way "help people improve" is just not viable. Too many players would just not put any effort in - "why should I try at all if in 30 re-spawns time this will be much easier?" and this (I'm guessing) is not how devs want the game played.

> > >

> > > the problem with this philosophy is, that youre basically making content for other players, than those who bought the game

> > > that is only good , if you didnt like the game in the first place

> > > if i wanted to play a hardcore game, i would had bought one

> >

> > Firstly, GW2 is far from "hardcore", it's one of the most casual friendly games and although the higher-end content requires more dedication, practice and experience, the OW and story content is relatively easy. Other MMOs load up your skill bar with 40-50 skills, GW2 has 15 at most (+5 for second weapon set and +10 for aquatic sets - but at any one time you only have a max of 15 skills I believe)

> > I'm guessing people having trouble with story instances are those who bought an expansion, took the lvl80 boost and jumped into PoF/HoT straight away. The game was never designed for this as the early levels help teach new players how their class functions to a certain degree. Unfortunately the alure of mounts/gliders is too great, so you often have this scenario.

> > Dumbing down the level80 part of the game to make it suitable for brand new players is a horrible idea. It would lead to people getting bored more quickly and hurt the playerbase.

>

> so getting bored, and leaving AFTER you played the content is worse , than quitting before?

> and if they were the least interested in PLAYERBASE, dont you think they would have tried to keep more of the millions of players they had from start?

> story and open world should be for everybody, making it too hard will just make people quit and play something else

 

The point is, that, if new players started at the beginning without skipping straight to expansion material(level80 boost), they would naturally find the learning curve far more forgiving. You can blame the ANet for including these boosters for new expansions, or you can blame the new players for being too eager to achieve lvl80 - both have valid arguments for/against but this is not the topic of the discussion. The topic is about difficulty of story mode and my advice for new players is this - If you are finding the PoF/HoT story too difficult, go back to the core story and work your way through that as it's less demanding and helps you get used to the controls. If you're finding the core story too hard, perhaps this game is not for you, it doesn't get easier than vanilla going forward.

[Khisanth.2948]

> @"MarshallLaw.9260" said:

> > @"battledrone.8315" said:

> > > @"MarshallLaw.9260" said:

> > > > @"battledrone.8315" said:

> > > > > @"MarshallLaw.9260" said:

> > > > > > @"Warscythes.9307"

> > > > > Personal story content has never been hard enough to warrant this. If a player is stuck at a certain stage, they are either not familiar with combat mechanics of their class, under-geared or simply need some help.

> > > > > If you are finding the basic fight difficult, check your gear and build are suitable - don't expect to be able to survive in a lvl80 zone with lvl15 _Fine_ gear. If build and gear are in order, it's your combat which needs work. If you cannot improve, ask friend for help.

> > > > > After finishing the regular PoF story path, I went back to complete some of the chapter achievements and found that there was one where I couldn't complete on my own (_Keen Eye_ achievement https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Hallowed_Ground_(story)), so I just requested assistance from a friend in my guild.

> > > > >

> > > > > The idea that making something easier and dumbing it down is a good way "help people improve" is just not viable. Too many players would just not put any effort in - "why should I try at all if in 30 re-spawns time this will be much easier?" and this (I'm guessing) is not how devs want the game played.

> > > >

> > > > the problem with this philosophy is, that youre basically making content for other players, than those who bought the game

> > > > that is only good , if you didnt like the game in the first place

> > > > if i wanted to play a hardcore game, i would had bought one

> > >

> > > Firstly, GW2 is far from "hardcore", it's one of the most casual friendly games and although the higher-end content requires more dedication, practice and experience, the OW and story content is relatively easy. Other MMOs load up your skill bar with 40-50 skills, GW2 has 15 at most (+5 for second weapon set and +10 for aquatic sets - but at any one time you only have a max of 15 skills I believe)

> > > I'm guessing people having trouble with story instances are those who bought an expansion, took the lvl80 boost and jumped into PoF/HoT straight away. The game was never designed for this as the early levels help teach new players how their class functions to a certain degree. Unfortunately the alure of mounts/gliders is too great, so you often have this scenario.

> > > Dumbing down the level80 part of the game to make it suitable for brand new players is a horrible idea. It would lead to people getting bored more quickly and hurt the playerbase.

> >

> > so getting bored, and leaving AFTER you played the content is worse , than quitting before?

> > and if they were the least interested in PLAYERBASE, dont you think they would have tried to keep more of the millions of players they had from start?

> > story and open world should be for everybody, making it too hard will just make people quit and play something else

>

> The point is, that, if new players started at the beginning without skipping straight to expansion material(level80 boost), they would naturally find the learning curve far more forgiving. You can blame the ANet for including these boosters for new expansions, or you can blame the new players for being too eager to achieve lvl80 - both have valid arguments for/against but this is not the topic of the discussion. The topic is about difficulty of story mode and my advice for new players is this - If you are finding the PoF/HoT story too difficult, go back to the core story and work your way through that as it's less demanding and helps you get used to the controls. If you're finding the core story too hard, perhaps this game is not for you, it doesn't get easier than vanilla going forward.

 

That advice is debatable since core personal story has rollercoaster difficult levels. Most of it is probably fine but there are also some random spikes.

[Steve The Cynic.3217]

> @"battledrone.8315" said:

> > @"Steve The Cynic.3217" said:

> > > @"battledrone.8315" said:

> > > story and open world should be for everybody, making it too hard will just make people quit and play something else

> >

> > I'm going to change one word in that sentence. Tell me if you think it becomes more or less true...

> >

> > "story and open world should be for everybody, making it too **easy** will just make people quit and play something else"

> >

> > If you make it too hard, the less focussed players will become frustrated and quit, but if you make it too easy, the more focussed players will become bored and quit. Not the hard-core raiders or PvP gods, but the people who like to play through stories and have the climactic fights be, well, climactic.

> >

> > Perhaps all I'm saying is that you CANNOT make any one piece of the game "for everybody". Despite the complaints about it (common to many games), the writing for the main story is NOT desperately bad (I quite like most of it, in fact). There are places where it has unwarranted continuity breaks (e.g. when a Sylvari player goes to see the Pale Tree in the Claw Island segment of the core PS, and the Pale Tree talks to the character in the same phrasing she uses with non-Sylvari), but all stories have that. For sure not everyone plays an MMORPG for its story/stories (some load up a story-heavy MMORPG like SWTOR or even GW2 and jump straight into PvP of some sort and never, ever touch even one word of story ever after), but many do, and they have a wide, wide range of skill at learning to play. Some people, frankly, suck at playing, and suck at learning to play better, and there's relatively little you can do for them without inducing the more skilled to die of boredom.

> >

> > The most recent major expansion of SWTOR, "Knights of the Eternal Throne," includes a fairly serious, slightly mechanicky fight against one of the major antagonists. It's not mechanicky like the Glint's Lair segment of LS2 is, with the faffing about picking up colours, transferring fragility, and all that stuff, but it isn't *just* spank-and-tank. I found it a bit heavy going until I "connected" to the mechanics, at which point it became fairly straightforward. It turns out that it's a lot closer to just spank-and-tank than you might at first think.

> >

> > And of course the SWTOR forums are littered with the corpses of threads where someone hit that fight and bounced, and posted a vitriolic complaint about impossible fights in main-line story content. In almost every case, the ones who just ask for help get useful advice, and the ones who post bile about it being impossible get mocked more or less politely by players who are, evidently, "impossibilists", capable of doing the impossible, i.e. beating the fight.

>

> everyone is going to quit at one point, the question is, how much of the game they get to play before that happens

> its not desperately bad? zaitan? does that ring a bell?

> "going to the desert, to kill a god"...do you think THAT is good story?

> it isnt, it has more plot holes and and even less continuity than the last jedi

 

Clichés in the top-level eight-word summary of the story do not make the *story* bad. In a sense, almost all MMORPG plots can be reduced to "good guy meets bad guy, good guy wins". That doesn't make them all bad, and it doesn't make them all the same either. I won't get into the point that the top-level summary is "going to the desert to stop a god from destroying the world", which is just as clichéd as your version. The fact that you kill him to do so is definitely a plot detail. As for Zhaitan, the main issue for me was the speed at which the "personal story" of each combination of race and creation-time choices and so on coalesced / converged into a single story. (Compare: SWTOR, where the per-class stories remain separate right up to the end of the release-time story content.)

 

Anyway, what makes a good story is not that it is or is not in this or that clichéd pigeon-hole.(1) A great story is great because of the detailed evolution of events and of the characters. I *liked* the way that PoF followed up the barbed knife that LS3 stuck in my character's backstory, and *twisted* it. (Human, chose that people said she was blessed by Balthazar...)

 

Where I *do* find fault with GW2 storytelling isn't the stories, but the fact that they are punctuated by boss fights of a significantly elevated difficulty compared to the content that precedes and follows them. Not that it is *hard*, but that it is of a significantly different difficulty than the path *to* the fight and the path *from* the fight. (It's the *step* rather than the levels that is problematic.)

 

Shrug. It's all subjective, anyway.

 

(1) Most critics find that *The Hobbit* is a good story, even though it is "group of adventurers kill a dragon and steal its treasure" which is about as cliché as you can get.